This blog will follow my adventures traveling around South America and teaching English in Santiago, Chile.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

The miners are alive!

So I haven't commented on this on my blog at all, but the miners are alive!

I watched some live TV coverage with Cristian, and now I can hear people honking their car horns as they drive by. Everyone is happy for this good news.

So here's a short summary of what happened:

There was a mining accident in Copiapó, Chile (450 miles north of Santiago) on August 5th. There were 33 miners trapped in a mine about 700 m below ground. The mine had had problems with accidents before this and was considered unsafe. There were supposed to be repairs done to the mine before it was reopened, but for whatever reason it was reopened without those repairs.

Sebastian Piñera (Chile´s President) was actually at the mine when they received news of them being alive. They lowered a line with some paper to them (along with food water and oxygen), and they wrote a message to return to everyone with the news of them all being alive.

Here´s a link to a news story about it in English:

http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCATRE67L1H620100822

I couldn´t imagine being trapped like they have been for over 2 weeks now. Furthermore, I can´t imagine what their families have been going through this entire time. While they haven´t yet been able to reach them to let them out, the news of them being alive is nothing short of a miracle.